Just Finished Chrono Trigger

[Falksi]

what the hell CT and Cross don't even have forced random encounters. just walk away from the monsters bro.

Yes they do. Certain sections, specifically next to the gates (which you have enter any times over before getting the Epoch) have must-play battles (usually triggered by floor panels)

granted but while you can't do a pacifist run of chrono trigger it remains one of those jrpgs that actually put monsters on the world itself and allows you to avoid many of them. a lot of great jrpgs are more repetitive than chrono trigger will ever be.

But those enemies are in the same place every time you play. Which then means you're forced into the same methods of avoidance each time you play too. So it's still repetitive as you're never surprised by random elements.

 

[Delterius]

So it's still repetitive as you're never surprised by random elements.

It's still repetitive but it's also not the same thing. If you specifically have low tolerance of playing the same fights over and over, then you simply don't play Chrono Trigger or a lot of blobbers and JRPGs. If you have a general low tolerance for all forms of repetition... you don't replay a JRPG with a linear storyline. AKA most of them. But if you want to replay Chrono Trigger for whatever reason but you don't want to fight all the trash in the world you can.

 

[Grimlorn]

So it's still repetitive as you're never surprised by random elements.

It's still repetitive but it's also not the same thing. If you specifically have low tolerance of playing the same fights over and over, then you simply don't play Chrono Trigger or a lot of blobbers and JRPGs. If you have a general low tolerance for all forms of repetition... you don't replay a JRPG with a linear storyline. AKA most of them. But if you want to replay Chrono Trigger for whatever reason but you don't want to fight all the trash in the world you can.

Simple to understand, but difficult for the nitpicking hipsters to understand. A lot of JRPGs with their random encounters all have the same 5 or so encounters in each area, which means you're fighting the same mobs over and over as well if you replay those games. It's just not a real point to make like many of the points being made against CT while other JRPGs are defended for having the same kind of "flaws". I never thought I'd see the day when people would, after so many complaints of random encounters in JRPGS, all of a sudden switch to complaining that you can see the enemies on your map and avoid 95% of them.

 

[Falksi]

So it's still repetitive as you're never surprised by random elements.

It's still repetitive but it's also not the same thing. If you specifically have low tolerance of playing the same fights over and over, then you simply don't play Chrono Trigger or a lot of blobbers and JRPGs. If you have a general low tolerance for all forms of repetition... you don't replay a JRPG with a linear storyline. AKA most of them. But if you want to replay Chrono Trigger for whatever reason but you don't want to fight all the trash in the world you can.

But ultimately each Chrono Trigger playthrough is far more similar than all those other JRPGs and lobbers because of it's overall setup. Namely same enemies, same places, same "press A to win" for 90% of the game.

No offence chap but a few posts ago you were telling me there are no forced battles when there clearly are. I suggest you try replaying it in full and just analyzing it a bit closer.

So it's still repetitive as you're never surprised by random elements.

It's still repetitive but it's also not the same thing. If you specifically have low tolerance of playing the same fights over and over, then you simply don't play Chrono Trigger or a lot of blobbers and JRPGs. If you have a general low tolerance for all forms of repetition... you don't replay a JRPG with a linear storyline. AKA most of them. But if you want to replay Chrono Trigger for whatever reason but you don't want to fight all the trash in the world you can.

Simple to understand, but difficult for the nitpicking hipsters to understand. A lot of JRPGs with their random encounters all have the same 5 or so encounters in each area, which means you're fighting the same mobs over and over as well if you replay those games. It's just not a real point to make like many of the points being made against CT while other JRPGs are defended for having the same kind of "flaws". I never thought I'd see the day when people would, after so many complaints of random encounters in JRPGS, all of a sudden switch to complaining that you can see the enemies on your map and avoid 95% of them.

Miles off the mark.

The complaint is that the game on the whole is unengaging because of the repetitive setup combined with the ridiculously easy combat.

There are good ways and bad ways of doing similar things, and when it comes to combat Chrono Trigger is only good if you like no resistance in games. If that's your thing fine, it's not mine. But let's not make out having a core part of the game totally limp is "nitpicking"

Wanting good combat to be part of a JRPG to make it good is hardly being unreasonable.

 

[Hellraiser]

I'm not sure how the backtracking to the gates and avoiding the same enemies in the same sections again is such a huge deal. There's always one gate per era that doesn't have that many enemies between it and the entrance from the world map (the medieval gate at the future site of the fairground has what, 2 encounters? 3 encounters?). And the world map itself has no encounters. Besides those sections, which other sections does one really need to do more than once in a single playthrough?

And how many times do you really need to backtrack per era to a gate, before you get the epoch? 3 at most in the case of the medieval era that has 3 "chapters" (Marle missing, getting Masamune and the final one with Magus) and 2 for every other era? There's maybe an argument to be made if you are playing it for the first time and maybe need to go back and forth to figure where the hell to go to next, but in general, by design, that is just 3 times at most. On top of that if you are again at the same section and again hit a mandatory combat tile trigger, by the time you revisit it the party is so strong you can probably just cast whatever AOE technique and one shot the lot. Still not nearly as repetitive as seeing the same pack of 5 monsters while climbing up that magic tower in FF6 every 5 steps.

One could argue that having some areas, like the gates, where the encounters trigger just once with other areas with respawning dedicated to grinding would be better, but again that's not a huge deal since those near-gate sections are very short.

 

[Falksi]

I'm not sure how the backtracking to the gates and avoiding the same enemies in the same sections again is such a huge deal. There's always one gate per era that doesn't have that many enemies between it and the entrance from the world map (the medieval gate at the future site of the fairground has what, 2 encounters? 3 encounters?). And the world map itself has no encounters. Besides those sections, which other sections does one really need to do more than once in a single playthrough?

And how many times do you really need to backtrack per era to a gate, before you get the epoch? 3 at most in the case of the medieval era that has 3 "chapters" (Marle missing, getting Masamune and the final one with Magus) and 2 for every other era? There's maybe an argument to be made if you are playing it for the first time and maybe need to go back and forth to figure where the hell to go to next, but in general, by design, that is just 3 times at most. On top of that if you are again at the same section and again hit a mandatory combat tile trigger, by the time you revisit it the party is so strong you can probably just cast whatever AOE technique and one shot the lot. Still not nearly as repetitive as seeing the same pack of 5 monsters while climbing up that magic tower in FF6 every 5 steps.

One could argue that having some areas, like the gates, where the encounters trigger just once with other areas with respawning dedicated to grinding would be better, but again that's not a huge deal since those near-gate sections are very short.

Even not playing it for the first time if you aren't using a guide and want to explore with the promise of something there, and pickup various items etc. too, you still have to engage these fights too much for my liking. It's just feels samey and kills the pace.

I don't disagree with FF6, I think that's a bit lacking in variety too in fact that suffers from too many scripted fights, but FF5's job systems means literally every fight can feel totally different.

It is bizarre seeing so many folk not even acknowledge CT's flaws. I'd still have is as a B-Tier game even though I don't personally like it, but I'm not gonna deny flaws which bogged my experience of it down. If it doesn't bother others fine.

 

[Hellraiser]

It's more like a Bioware game vs a Black Isle/Troika one. There are clearly more complex and deep games of the time in the genre, but this one is more of a simpler game of its genre with better mass market appeal. It is overrated in the same way Ocarina of Time is overrated, that is it is a solid adventure, that has some unique things going for it so that it can be memorable, has high production values, but it is not particularly deep just polished, all of which contributed to console and non-hardcore gamers elevating it and praising it as something mindblowing.

The game is a light-hearted time traveling adventure anime in JRPG clothes clearly aimed at a teen crowd (just how far into teens is debatable) with good production values, nothing more nothing less. As far as JRPGs go, the combat is ok although relying on gimmicks in encounters rather than mechanical depth. At the very least it requires you to remember the tactical rock paper scissors for the given monster gimmick or optimal tech for a particular batch of monsters, unlike say Star Ocean (the PSP remake) which in my experience was just brainless mash X to win and retreat apart from 3 boss encounters and the colloseum (maybe).

 

[Ryan muller]

I don't disagree with FF6, I think that's a bit lacking in variety too in fact that suffers from too many scripted fights, but FF5's job systems means literally every fight can feel totally different.

In order to master most abilities for each job you literally will spend 2-4 hours grinding in the same place with the same enemies tho

And this is without talking about the red mage.

I get some of your complains

But fighting 2 times with enemies that are extremely easy to kill and have atleast some variety from place to place in which you can avoid 80% of them in a game that takes 20 hours to beat really bother you to the level of actually thinking that ff5 has a better pacing for the fights?

The encounter rate from the second world onwards alone can get anyone crazy

 

[Gastrick]

Miles off the mark.

The complaint is that the game on the whole is unengaging because of the repetitive setup combined with the ridiculously easy combat.

There are good ways and bad ways of doing similar things, and when it comes to combat Chrono Trigger is only good if you like no resistance in games. If that's your thing fine, it's not mine. But let's not make out having a core part of the game totally limp is "nitpicking"

Everything is nitpicking to Chronic Triggereds.

 

[Grimlorn]

Miles off the mark.

The complaint is that the game on the whole is unengaging because of the repetitive setup combined with the ridiculously easy combat.

There are good ways and bad ways of doing similar things, and when it comes to combat Chrono Trigger is only good if you like no resistance in games. If that's your thing fine, it's not mine. But let's not make out having a core part of the game totally limp is "nitpicking"

Everything is nitpicking to Chronic Triggereds.

You still whining about people enjoying Chrono Trigger?

Here's a tip on not nitpicking. Don't criticize a game's combat for being too easy, when 99% of JRPGs and the ones you and Falksi praise also have easy combat. Don't criticize aspects of a game that exist in other games you like. It makes you sound like a hypocrite or an idiot. Don't pretend you can just physically attack through everything, and ignore when someone points out there is a dungeon/cave in which all the monsters are only vuln to magic. Don't whine that when you replay a game you have to fight the same enemies, because that's true in every other game. Don't whine that when you fall through a trap door and it leads to mobs ambushing you when you try to leave.

You idiots are beyond moronic, but please keep posting about the things you don't like about CT. It's amusing to read and see how delusional people can be.

 

[Gastrick]

Miles off the mark.

The complaint is that the game on the whole is unengaging because of the repetitive setup combined with the ridiculously easy combat.

There are good ways and bad ways of doing similar things, and when it comes to combat Chrono Trigger is only good if you like no resistance in games. If that's your thing fine, it's not mine. But let's not make out having a core part of the game totally limp is "nitpicking"

Everything is nitpicking to Chronic Triggereds.

You still whining about people enjoying Chrono Trigger?

Here's a tip on not nitpicking. Don't criticize a game's combat for being too easy, when 99% of JRPGs and the ones you and Falksi praise also have easy combat. Don't criticize aspects of a game that exist in other games you like. It makes you sound like a hypocrite or an idiot. Don't pretend you can just physically attack through everything, and ignore when someone points out there is a dungeon/cave in which all the monsters are only vuln to magic. Don't whine that when you replay a game you have to fight the same enemies, because that's true in every other game. Don't whine that when you fall through a trap door and it leads to mobs ambushing you when you try to leave.

You idiots are beyond moronic, but please keep posting about the things you don't like about CT. It's amusing to read and see how delusional people can be.

Your Chrono Nigger sucks, chronically triggered. The easy combat is the least of it's problems, where every boss fight only involves repeating the right special move over and over again and getting the right equipment. Phantasy Star IV (and Live a Live as well to some degree) require the player to react to unexpected moves that can one shot your team. Flaws do exist in all JRPGs, some worse than others, where a major flaw in FF7 was the ATB combat. The rectangular/non-isometric viewpoint on Chrono Nigger and other snes games sucks. The story is un-engaging and even with emotionally manipulative music, the lame characters are impossible to care about. For any RPG to be great, it needs to excel in the combination of these three aspects, but Chrono Trigger isn't any good at any of them. Your IGN-esque tastes can go suck my cock.

 

[Ninjerk]

Uh oh, someone's favorite game got criticized!

 

[†††]

In order to master most abilities for each job you literally will spend 2-4 hours grinding in the same place with the same enemies tho

Or you can just not grind to master every job and play the game as normally. Criticizing a game for its optional stuff, what's next?

 

[Poseidon00]

(and Live a Live as well to some degree)

Oh yeah IIRC it did have a few enemies with one-hit kill moves and a few superbosses who were more difficult than I would have expected. The Golden Mammoth or whatever in the Stone Age saga is no joke.

Honestly, a highly enjoyable little bite sized rpg all around. They don't make em like they used to.

 

[newtmonkey]

I enjoyed playing through Chrono Trigger "recently" (5-6 years ago), but I see what Falksi is saying. Because the encounters are in fixed locations, it felt more like "grinding" to me than standard random encounters when going back through areas you'd already explored, even though there were not many encounters overall. You can of course avoid some but not all of them, so that helps.

That was only a minor problem for me though, I found it to be a short but sweet game.

 

[Grimlorn]

Flaws do exist in all JRPGs, some worse than others, where a major flaw in FF7 was the ATB combat.

The flaw with FF7 isn't the ATB combat which can be turned off btw. It's got the same problems that Chrono Trigger supposedly has where you can just physically attack everything and win. It even has Knights of the Round, which is a one shot button for every boss except the optional ones. Of course I wouldn't criticize the game for this because that would make me a hypocrite, and having the materia system and playing with it was fun, just like the tech system in CT is fun.

The story is un-engaging and even with emotionally manipulative music,

All music is built to evoke emotion, especially in TV, movies and games. Complaining about this is irrational and shows how butthurt you are.

 

[Ryan muller]

In order to master most abilities for each job you literally will spend 2-4 hours grinding in the same place with the same enemies tho

Or you can just not grind to master every job and play the game as normally. Criticizing a game for its optional stuff, what's next?

Lmao, imagine thinking you would spend just 4 hours to max out every job.

I wasnt even adressing crazy shit kind of stuff.

Just the overall grinding you will end up making in order to you know... Have fun with the job system.

 

[†††]

Just the overall grinding you will end up making in order to you know... Have fun with the job system.

Plenty of chances to make fun combinations and learn abilities by playing normally. You don't need to get X-Fight and X-Magic in every playthrough. They aren't even needed to beat Shinryu & Omega. The overpowered abilities and their high cost are there as a plus for dedicated players, such option does not detract from the system.

 

[Ryan muller]

Just the overall grinding you will end up making in order to you know... Have fun with the job system.

Plenty of chances to make fun combinations and learn abilities by playing normally. You don't need to get X-Fight and X-Magic in every playthrough. They aren't even needed to beat Shinryu & Omega. The overpowered abilities and their high cost are there as a plus for dedicated players, such option does not detract from the system.

Except im not talking about OP abilities necessarily nor being a master at all of them.

Anyone playing this game and not aiming to do challenge runs will grind in order to get some abilities as its most important feature is the job system itself.

A non grind player wont have the chance to experiment with a lot of the system's tools refusing to do so by loosing important and cool hybrids they could do as having dualcast for example or the mimic abilities or even the casual jobs itself.

Hell even on the Four job fiesta challenge people will have dedicated spots for grinding, and thats literally one job to the end.

The game has its Difficulty spikes that new players will have a hard time with and it has its cool systems to play with, you just cant argue that you wont be loosing time with such.


And even without it, the encounter rate is constantly high after the first world and it will be a time waster.

Im not saying the job system is a negative for ff5 but with all of this in the game, you just cant argue it will be less of a time waster than CT when in CT you have very minimal stuff to care with when it comes to enemy encounters and grinding.

 

[newtmonkey]

I disagree Ryan muller , I played through FF5 just last year, and did not have to grind at all to get through the game. I didn't do any research whatsoever on optimal ability combinations, and really just took whatever jobs I thought seemed cool (in other words, my choices were probably pretty retarded).

Experimenting with the job system is completely optional imo. You can easily beat the game with subpar choices if you know how JRPGs or specifically how FF works. Once you have access to white, black, time, and summon magic, you can figure something out. Haste and slow, for example, are useful in pretty much every battle. I never got mimic or dualcast abilities, though I can imagine they must be powerful.

The game does have difficulty spikes, but so do most games. The solution is not necessarily to grind exp or JP, but to figure out what you are doing wrong. Sometimes, just changing a single character to a different job is enough to get through a difficult area.

The encounter rate can be high for sure, but you can always run away from annoying battles very easily. I didn't love every hour of FF5, but I don't think it wasted my time. I enjoyed most of my time with it.

 

[Ryan muller]

Experimenting with the job system is completely optional imo.

It is, my point being that not knowing what jobs you will get at each shrine and enjoying the system as much as pretty much everyone does, what would be the point of not experimenting with such? The whole point of FFV is the flexibility of the job system and as such almost anyone who plays it will end up grinding atleast a bit to master some of them.

The game does have difficulty spikes, but so do most games. The solution is not necessarily to grind exp or JP, but to figure out what you are doing wrong.

If you are a veteran jrpg player and enjoy challenge as much as i do, sure

But i will say this: I know every ich of final fantasy 9 for example to know that the very optimal strat to get the best of your end game stats are to play the whole game low level, after you unlocked some of the abilities that boost your stats up at each level, then you start to level up

This will mean everybody will do it? No. People will get scaried to do such things and to risk themselves specially going throught an old game completely blind, thats the same for going low level for SaGa endgame bossfights or whatever jrpg you could use as an example.

Most of the people who play those kinds of games for the first time will end up grinding instead of let themselves be challenged, avoiding frustration or failure as much as they can and you can confirm that by searching for some blind playtroughts or streams of this game by yourself.

The encounter rate can be high for sure, but you can always run away from annoying battles very easily. I didn't love every hour of FF5, but I don't think it wasted my time. I enjoyed most of my time with it.

Don't get me wrong, i love the hell out of ffv
But my point wasnt that the game was bad, but that you definitively will end up wasting more time than in CT, CT is a short game

Has no random encounters, specially not nearly as much fights than in FFV and its piss easy to the point you never need to grind or whatever

So, i cant really see any reason why anybody would think its pacing is faster.

 

[newtmonkey]

Ryan muller
Good points all around. A game like FF5 does indeed reward experimentation, and I wouldn't criticize someone for wanting to really explore its systems.

The only thing I would disagree with, is that I don't think you really waste more time in FF5. It's definitely a longer game than CT, but not by that much imo if you are playing both games honestly (not grinding and no walkthrough)—maybe 30 hours for FF5 vs 20 for CT. 10 hours is quire a difference, but I don't feel like I wasted 10 hours playing FF5, in fact it felt like just the right length for that game.

I get what you are saying re: random vs fixed encounters. I personally don't mind (reasonable) random encounters, and I don't think the encounter rate in FFV was that bad.

I also get what you say about most people not willing to actually play a game versus just grinding, but I think it's a bit of a shame. In my experience, most if not all JRPGs can be completed without grinding at all as you know. I just find it much more satisfying to get through a game with a low-level or weak party, versus grinding to make the whole game easy.

 

[Gastrick]

(and Live a Live as well to some degree)

Oh yeah IIRC it did have a few enemies with one-hit kill moves and a few superbosses who were more difficult than I would have expected. The Golden Mammoth or whatever in the Stone Age saga is no joke.

Honestly, a highly enjoyable little bite sized rpg all around. They don't make em like they used to.

Yeah, that boss at the end of the Chinese saga was really hard as well. He kept on killing my character over and over again, until I had to search the world for more healing items. Even then, I beat him a turn before he would've killed me. It is a really nice game, with it's little tragic stories and pseudo-tactical combat.

 

[Gastrick]

The story is un-engaging and even with emotionally manipulative music,

All music is built to evoke emotion, especially in TV, movies and games.

Yes, of course.

Flaws do exist in all JRPGs, some worse than others, where a major flaw in FF7 was the ATB combat.

The flaw with FF7 isn't the ATB combat which can be turned off btw. It's got the same problems that Chrono Trigger supposedly has where you can just physically attack everything and win. It even has Knights of the Round, which is a one shot button for every boss except the optional ones. Of course I wouldn't criticize the game for this because that would make me a hypocrite, and having the materia system and playing with it was fun, just like the tech system in CT is fun.

I know an example. Imagine person A says that one of the reasons an Adam Sandler movie is bad is that it's unfunny. Person B jumps in and says "but among your favorite films, you loved unfunny films as well, therefore there's nothing wrong with Adam Sandler movies not being funny". Person A replies that they liked the other films because being funny isn't the only thing good about a movie. Person B in turn says "99% of movies aren't funny, you hypocrite!".

Eventually with this thinking, nothing will have flaws because they could be found elsewhere in better games.

 

[Zariusz]

While this game is not from that era i recommend Black Sigil Blade Of the Exile. Its a DS game very inspired by Chrono Trigger, same combat system (though combat and exploration have different maps and you can move your characters during fight) and aesthetic. The biggest problem is the encounter rate, its very bugged and while encounters arent very hard the whole amount of them could grind you to dust and exhaust your party and eq. I didnt found any patch for this on web but if you are interested maybe you will find fix for this.

I found the patch that apparently reduces encounter rates by 2/3, hmm it was updated/uploaded just few months ago so its quite fresh, i didnt expect that someone would remember about this game so many years later. If anyone here wants more CT then this is as close as you can get without playing some CT hacks, also side quest about rescuing mother of one of the party members is bugged and completly stops your progress by blocking you in one room, though you can stiil take most of the loot and then just not go to bugged room leaving the quest unfinished.
https://www.gamebrew.org/wiki/Black_Sigil_-_Reasonable_Encounter_Rate